Following this morning's dismal employment sub-index from Chicago Fed PMI and the recent Philly Fed employment sub-index, the 'data' suggests that this week's (now confirmed by the BLS that NFP will be released on Friday as scheduled) payroll data could be the first negative print since September 2010. Of course, we are sure that pre-emptive Sandy 'action' and seasonal adjustments will explain away any miss from the current +125k estimate. Is this why the market is not levitating on moar broken windows?

Half an hour ago, just as the NYSE was preparing to unleash the AAPL selling onslaught, MarketNews released an errant PR in which it indicated that the Chicago PMI missed, coming at 49.9, or well below expectations of a 51.0 print. A few minutes ago MarketNews officially broke the Chicago PMI embargo early, and the early leak was confirmed, with the October PMI printing indeed at 49.9, a modest increase from 49.7 in September, but missing expectations for the third month in a row. And once again the headline belied how ugly the underlying data was, which as even MNI explained, saw the employment index slide to 50.3 from 52.0, and just barely above contraction. Either way, this was the lowest print in 33 months. Surely this will be enough for another massive NFP beat on Friday.

Weak earnings over the last few days, notable weakness in Canadian GDP this morning and two dismal prints for Chicago PMI (early) and NAPM-Milwaukee all dragged on S&P 500 futures into the open. From strong overnight gains, ES was exactly at Friday's highs when the day-session opened. AAPL immediately dropped further from pre-open - down more than 2.5% at $586 (<200DMA) - note average trade size so far this morning is extremely high for AAPL. Insurers are being hit hard with TRV down 1.9%, CB down 0.9%, ALL down 0.7%, and AIG down 1.2%. Some of the most stunning moves are in: UBS +14% (they should fire more people we guess), bankrupt A123 +13%, and Western Union -25% (miss).

If the just released 2013-2016 latest re-re-revised budget out of the Athens Finance Ministry (whose basement was forever memorialized in the following picture) is all Greek to you, it's because it is. But even it wasn't, it would still be absolute gibberish and yet another failed study in the analysis of animal entrails in order to predict the future. Why? We have extracted merely one data series: the brand new debt/GDP (ignoring for a second the -4.5% 2013 GDP forecast - already 0.5% worse than the just released IMF forecast for Greece for the same period and certainly worse than the May forecast of 2013 "growth"), and have compared it to the Debt/GDP "forecast" as of May 2010, when the first Greek bailout was announced. The numbers speak for themselves.

Given Sandy's status as 'worse than the worst case', it is perhaps not surprising that our estimate of the total cost being in the $50-100 billion range is not totally off mark given the discussions that ensued. By comparison Katrina's total loss/damage cost was $108bn. BofAML is a little more hopeful with estimates in the $10-20bn range - which seems optimistic to us, and further note that while it is a big hit to wealth, once the offsetting effects (Keynesian broken windows?) are taken into account, it will likely have a very small impact on economic growth. Sandy is still in the Top 5 in terms of economic damage among modern hurricanes, and as BofAML adds, ironically, Sandy may even contribute further to the policy bickering in Washington. With so much of our central-banker-in-chief's efforts focused on raising our wealth perception, we wonder if this will have greater implications than merely the physical damage.

We noted yesterday that European traders in the USA's 'first stock' AAPL were far less sanguine about the recent dismissals than the plthora of bloviators appearing in ouyr screens to calm down the maddening crowd. It seems, from pre-market trading, that Europe was right. AAPL is down 1.2% (with the market broadly up 0.5%), trading below $600 at $596 (inching closer to its 200DMA recent lows at $588), retracing much of its 'v-shaped' recovery from Friday.

A cyber attack does not have to be limited to a single country and its networks. It could be used to strike multiple countries and fuel a global firestorm of systems failures. Globalists need a macro-crisis, a world-wide catastrophe, in order to present their “global solution” to the desperate masses. This solution will invariably include more dominance for them, and less freedom for us. A global crisis can also be used to manipulate various cultures to forget concerns of sovereignty and think in terms of one-world action. Surely, a worldwide breakdown can only be solved if we “all work together and all think alike”, right...? Without a doubt, a cyber attack serves the interests of elitist entities and banking monstrosities like nothing else in existence. Set off a nuke, start WWIII, turn the U.S. dollar into stagflationary dust; a cyber attack tops them all, because a cyber attack can lead to them all while maintaining deniability for the establishment. The fact that whispers of cyber threats have turned into bullhorn blasted propaganda should concern us all. Are we being conditioned for a cyber event in the near future? That remains to be seen. However, none of us should be surprised if one does occur, especially in light of the many gains involved for globalists, and all of us should be ready to dismantle and expose any lies surrounding the event before the American public is whipped into a 9/11 style frenzy yet again

If trying to explain why S&P futures are up another 9 points to 1417, and are now 25 ticks from the Monday night lows, there are so many catalysts: perhaps it was the European September unemployment rate rising to a new record of 11.6%, (Italy unemployment is now 10.8% up from 10.6% but it still has a way to go until it hits Spain's 25%) even as Consumer prices kept inflation at a steady 2.5% rate, or that French producer prices rose more than expected even as spending missed expectations, or that Spanish housing permits collapsed by 37.2% in August from July, or that Greek retail sales plunged by 7.2% Y/Y and the Greek 2013 economic outlook was cut in the latest budget with the budget deficit now seen at 5.2% from 4.2% before and that Greece now sees 189.1% debt/GDP in 2013 up from 175.6% in 2012, or that Japan just cut its economic outlook last night after its manufacturing PMI came at 46.9, the lowest since 2009 excluding Fukushima, or that UK consumer confidence printed -30, vs -28 last and the lowest since April, or that Taiwan slashed its 2012 GDP forecast from 1.66% to 1.05%, or that nothing has been resolved on the Greek labor reforms or the now two month overdue Troika bailout, or that insolvent Spain has still not requested a bailout, or that virtually every company that has reported revenues in the last two "dark days" missed expectations, or that US Mortgage applications tumbled 6% for its fourth straight weekly decline (government refi index down 5.5%, mortgage apps down 4.8%), or of course that Hurricane Sandy will cut both Q4 GDP and corporate profits (not to mention sales). Truly, there are so many reasons why the S&P has now soared since Apple announced the termination of its two key executives on Monday afternoon, one doesn't know where to start (and don't you dare say "window dressing"). Perhaps Kevin Henry would, but sadly his Bloomberg status is now "gray"...

In a stunningly accurate prediction of what to expect from a 100-year storm, the following 2011 report assessing the 'risk increase to infrastructure due to a sea level rise' provides everything you did not want to know about just how bad the situation is with recovery from Sandy's damage but were afraid to ask. Based on extrapolations from storm surge heights, the authors see a 'perfect storm' of this magnitude likely creating a total loss between $50 and $100bn. As Atlantic Cities notes, citing the report: The researchers also estimate that... it could take the subway system about 21 days to get working at 90 percent functionality. If all potential damage is considered, ...that timeline could increase to several months, and that "permanent restoration of the system to the full revenue service that was previously available could take more than two years."

With the US elections approaching next week, as well as the threat of another fiscal cliff showdown looming, we look at how the expansive Central State has come to dominate both private society (i.e., the community) and the marketplace, to the detriment of the nation’s social and economic stability. We examine six critical dynamics that will lead to the devolution of Peak Government. "Governments, desperate for more revenues, ignore public resentment and loss of trust, which only deepens the disconnect between those in government and the public. And the private citizenry sees a lack of accountability, soaring public debt, accounting trickery, political dysfunction, and mal-investment of public funds as the hallmarks of their government."

Defending the indefensible? In the past weeks, there has been a 'revival' of news related to high-profile inside trading cases. Insider trading is accurately pictured in that great movie called "Wall Street", by a famous line of Gordon Gekko to Bud Fox. Gordon said: "If you’re not inside, you are outside". Gordon was right. If only people understood that this is just a natural thing... It has nothing to do with ethics. Yes, we know that there is something in our argument that may not make sense to you... and we dare to guess that it is because you expect fairness when you invest your savings in a public security (i.e. a stock or a bond). But in all honesty…have you ever asked yourself why you expect fairness? We are not implying people should not trust those who issue or market these securities. But if they do, they should recognize that there is the risk that they may suffer a loss due to insider trading. Public securities, ceteris paribus, should trade at a discount to private securities, to compensate for the risk of lack of control and transparency. Yet, today, the opposite applies.